Daniel: Absurdity

"God had brought Daniel into favour and tender love with the prince of the eunuchs." 1:9

Melzar was worried that he'd get in trouble with the king if Daniel and his companions ate only pulse and water.
So Daniel proposed a test: try it and see how they looked compared to the meat eaters. After only ten days, the vegans were way
"fairer and fatter." 1:11-16

The king found Daniel and his companions to be ten times wiser than "all the magicians and astrologers in the realm." 1:20

Nebuchadnezzar has a disturbing dream. He commands his astrologers and magicians to interpret it for him,
but none of them could do it. So he threatens to cut them to pieces. Then Daniel shows up and interprets the dream. 2:1-26

Nebuchadnezzar's dream
He saw a gold headed image with silver chest and arms, brass belly and thighs, iron legs with feet part iron and part clay.
A stone smashed the image, scattering the gold, silver, brass, and iron in the wind. The stone became a great mountain that filled the whole earth.
2:28-35

Daniel's interpretation
The image's gold head is Nebuchadnezzar. He will be replaced by another kingdom (silver chest and arms), which will be replaced by a third kingdom
(brass belly and thighs), and a fourth kingdom (iron legs). This last kingdom with be both
strong and weak (feet of iron and clay). Then God will raise
up one final kingdom, which will destroy the other kingdoms and last forever. 2:36-44

"Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory."
(I didn't know that Nebuchadnezzar was the "king of kings." I always that that was Jesus!) 2:37

King Nebuchadnezzar was so impressed by Daniel's interpretation that he fell on his face and worships him. He commands everyone else to worship him, too,
and makes Daniel the most powerful person in the empire. 2:46-48

"Your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings."
Nebuchadnezzar became a Jew (a believer in Daniel's God) the moment he heard Daniel's interpretation of his dream. 2:47

Nebuchadnezzar built a statue of gold sixty cubits high and six cubits wide. Taking
a cubit to be 18 inches and assuming the depth to also be six cubits, this would give
a total volume of 270 cubic yards -- which would have probably been more than all of the gold in all of
the kingdoms of the world at that time. 3:1

Nebuchadnezzar invited all the officials in his kingdom to come to the dedication of the gold statue. Whoever refuses to worship the statue
will be thrown into a fiery furnace. So they all came and worshiped the golden image. 3:2-7

But some noticed that Daniel's friends (Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego) didn't worship the gold statue. So they told
Nebuchadnezzar about it, who commanded that they be thrown into a fiery furnace that was seven times as hot as usual. The furnace was so
hot ("exceeding hot") that it burned to death the soldiers who threw in Daniel's friends. 3:8-23

"Nebuchadnezzar ... commanded that they should heat the furnace one seven times more than it was wont to be heated." 3:19

Daniel's three friends were cast into a fiery furnace, but were totally unaffected -- not even a hair was singed. And they were joined by the
Son of God (Jesus?), himself! At least that's who Nebuchadnezzar thought it looked like. 3:24-27

Nebuchadnezzar converts again to Judaism (see 2:47 for his first conversion) and decrees that anyone who says anything against the Hebrew
god "shall be cut in pieces, and their houses shall be made a dunghill." 3:28-30

Nebuchadnezzar's second dream
Nebuchadnezzar dreams about a tree that was so tall that it could be seen "from the end of the earth." (Only on a flat earth would this be possible.)
A "holy watcher" came down from heaven and began screaming, saying that someone should chop down the tree. But he said the stump should be left and a
band of iron and brass put around it. Then have the banded stump hang out with the beasts and the grass, change the stump's heart from a man's heart to a
beast's heart, and "let seven times pass over him." 4:10-16

Daniel's interpretation
The tree in Nebuchadnezzar's dream is Nebuchadnezzar himself, who will soon be eating grass and living with animals until seven times passes over him.
4:25

And it all happened just like Daniel said it would. Nebuchadnezzar lived with the animals and ate grass like an ox. His hair was like
eagles' feathers and his nails like birds' claws. 4:28-33

While Nebuchadnezzar is busy eating grass, a "voice from heaven" falls from the sky repeating the same shit that Daniel said.
4:31-32

After going through a rather bizarre ordeal, inflicted upon him by God, Nebuchadnezzar heaps praise upon God -- in whose eyes
"all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing." 4:34-37

Belshazzar was partying with his princes, wives, and concubines when a detached hand starts writing on the wall. When the king sees it
"the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one against the other." 5:5-6

Belshazzar asked his wise men to read and interpret the writing, but none of them could. So his wife tells him to ask Daniel to do it.
And Daniel does, after insulting Belshazzar and his "father" Nebuchadnezzar. It's a message from God (he's the one who sent the hand down),
saying that God hates Belshazzar and will soon take his kingdom away from him and give it to the Medes and Persians. 5:8-28

After Daniel gave Belshazzar the bad news, Belshazzar rewarded him by making him the "third ruler in the kindgdom." Later that night
Belshazzar died. (Did God kill him?) 5:29-30

The king preferred Daniel above everyone else in his kingdom because Daniel was such a perfect (and modest) guy. The other administrators
tried to find something wrong with him, but they couldn't. So they came up with another plan: attack his religion. Have the king sign a decree
saying that anyone who asked any god or man (other than the king) for anything in the next thirty days will be fed to the lions. 6:3-9

When Daniel heard about the new decree, he immediately broke it by going to his room to pray. The conspirators caught him in the act and told the king,
who cast Daniel into the lion den saying, "Don't worry. God will deliver you." 6:10-16

The next morning the king went to see how Daniel and the lions were doing. Daniel told him that God sent an angel to shut the lions' mouths.
God saved him because he was such a perfect (and modest) guy and he believed in God. (Nothing bad ever happens to good, religious people.)
6:23

Daniel's dream: "Daniel had a dream and visions of his head upon his bed." 7:1-28

"I Daniel was grieved in my spirit in the midst of my body, and the visions of my head troubled me." 7:15

"Hitherto is the end of the matter. As for me Daniel, my cogitations much troubled me." 7:28

"As he was speaking with me, I was in a deep sleep on my face toward the ground." 8:18

"I was astonished at the vision, but none understood it." (If Daniel couldn't understand his
visions, then how could anyone else?) This is the one true prophecy in the book of
Daniel: "none understood it." 8:27